Updates

Hello hello! Still no Price, life is coming at him extra hard right now. But it’s okay, you’ve all got me, T again, coming at you with this biweekly update.

Did you know that when you print thousands of things on dead tree pulp, they have to dry really really well before you can put them into boxes, shrink wrap them and then put them on a boat ship to another continent? Cause you do and that’s what is happening with the RPG products right now. They’re in a really loud room with lots of dehumidifiers running. 

We did get another sample in the mail! This one is from the production line and is a real life copy of the product.

Because everyone on the team works remotely, only one staff member was lucky enough to get the physical sample sent to them and was able to touch it, but touch it they did. They even filmed it for everyone to see. I’ve reread what I just wrote and I’m realizing I should clarify they were stroking the RPG Corebook UV finish on the title. Soon, you too will be able to stroke it. The finish.

Anyway, we also have had some questions about the PDF! The PDF version of the RPG will absolutely be delivered before the physical items. We’re planning to have the digital version start rolling out via Backer Kit’s Pledge Manager after SPIEL, after the team has recovered, so that we’ll be available and ready to help support any questions. It’ll include links to support documents for character creation and what-not, so you’ll have everything you need to start planning your campaign. We're working on making those support files printer-friendly cause no one should need to drain their yellow cartridge to have a cheat sheet.

There’s just too much happening with coordinating the production, ocean freight and the show to give the PDF rollout the attention it deserves before the show happens. If you want to dive in to start prepping for your campaign right away, Price linked the unfinished PDF back in December here that you can leverage for character and campaign creation.

And if you haven’t seen it yet, there were some fantastic Actual Plays filmed before the game was finalized that you can still watch to get a vibe for the play. Some things have changed, for sure, but not as much as you might think. We’ll have an update about the differences next time. And yes! We are working on getting Actual Play with the final rules released before the product arrives at your doors.

I don’t really want to jinx it but I’m going to tell you all this anyway because I’m too excited. It’s looking like maybe, just maybe, the miniatures will be arriving a little earlier than we were expecting. If that ends up being the case, we’ll be able to fulfill the RPG and the miniatures in the same shipment wave. This definitely still depends on the ships that the products get loaded on and their sail routes, but it’s looking good. We will have more info in the next update.

I have not figured out how to break into Price’s house while being 800 miles away but I did ask for a proof of life photo and he delivered. I think he thought that I was asking for one of him? Because I asked for a proof of life photo with Piranha Pigs and this is what he sent so I don’t think he understood my priority was the pigs. Also, I have questions. Also, don’t eat the minis.

Anyway, I then asked him instead if he had any photos from the factory and he did! This is what they sent him and then he sent me of the production status. Just tubs of hundreds of minis waiting to be trayed and packaged. 

Is anyone else getting Night at the Museum vibes because that last photo is giving me chills.

For those attending Essen SPIEL later this month, we’ll have RPG play sessions available for folks to play every day. We’ll also be highlighting Pub Crawlers, Mercenaries Wanted, and have Mercenary Packs (and most all accessories and core games) available for sale. If you’re not going to make it to Germany this fall and think PAXUnplugged in Philly is more likely, we’ll have play sessions there too, and the release of Mercenaries Wanted.

In other news, our Community Manager Pete has recently discovered he can ask Isaac to take photos as well and the results speak for themselves.

Righto! We'll be back with an update in October before we head to SPIEL with hopefully news about things on ships!

I’m not Price! I’m T and I’m filling in for Price this month while he is away for a bit. Let’s get into it!

RPG Production continues! 

Last week, a friend of ours was actually getting a tour of the production facility for their own company and saw the RPG in production! They were kind enough to send us a video of the printing plates being created. Can you see which faction deck printing plate is being made in this video? It’s very subtle.
 

And the video I could watch for hours - the playing card decks being printed. It’s mesmerizing. I should ask our friend to just film cards being printed for an hour straight and post it as an ASMR video.

He even snagged a photo of the official production copy sample as it was being built. The workers build this as they finish each step of production tooling and then review it to ensure it’s all correct before spinning up the main production. Then they’ll use it as a reference for building the units during assembly.

As mentioned, those videos and pictures were taken last week and so that means production is well underway. Drying and packing times all considered, we’re looking at a mid to late October loading of the boat. Ship? Boat. No, ship. Yeah, ship.

Miniature production continues! Sadly the minis are being made at a different facility, so we were not lucky enough to have someone snag footage of that production. Maybe when he’s done with the ASMR video he can take a train. 

We’ve submitted all the files needed for tray maps and packaging and will have the production samples approved for those ideally this week. 

With the flight stands issues resolved, production on the minis themselves are underway. So that’s on track!

No spinner video this update because I haven’t yet figured out how to steal the production samples from Price’s house, but maybe next update. I really really really want to show off the Piranha Pig in their full 3D Glory. Look at those fins!! And that snout!!

Result of Last Update’s Poll:
Last Update’s Poll asked which game are you excited to play first with the miniatures and 

Gloomhaven took the crown with a 6% lead over Frosthaven. 

Which leads me to wonder how many of you are going to attempt to paint your minis before getting them on the table. I’m personally a “play it no matter the paint state” kind of person, but I know that not everyone shares that opinion. Would you play a campaign with half-painted minis? What if they’re only primed? What if they’re never painted? Honestly, I rarely finish the mobs I don’t like to fight.

For those attending Essen SPIEL in October, we’ll have RPG play sessions available for folks to play every day. If you’re not going to make it to Germany this fall and think PAXUnplugged in Philly is more likely, we’ll have play sessions there too.

K! We'll be back in two weeks with more news and pictures and hopefully videos! See you all then!
-T

PS: I asked and our friend is already back from China. No card deck printing ASMR. Sorry, everyone.

Price here with your quick “Everything is in production!” update, let’s dive in!

RPG Production continues! 

Word from our factory is they need a couple more weeks to get the master proofing copies (MPCs) to us due to the Deluxe Box Set taking more time than they anticipated to produce.

We’ve got September 15th on the calendar as the pending ready date for those. Following our approval, assembly of all completed production components will begin.

We’ll have an updated timeline to reflect this new schedule in the next update.

Miniature production continues!

Our factory has finally solved the inconsistencies between models, flight stands, and base rings, so we are asking them to do what they can to ramp production up to make up for the lost time. 

In the meantime, we are on target this week to have all packaging and tray map files submitted to our manufacturer so they can produce full-art samples for us. 

We’ve previously taken a look at the Gloomhaven: Core Set and Gloomhaven: Summons models, today let’s hop over and take a closer look at the final production samples for the Frosthaven: Summons expansion set:

Result of Last Update’s Poll:

We received 287 votes in last update’s poll in which you shared what Mercenary Company you were joining “strictly on the vibes”. Our leading Mercenary Company ended up being TWILIGHT LANCE!

As a reward…Isaac told me I could let you a little bit more background on this group of ruffians:

END OF UPDATE

That's it for this week, we'll check back in on Sept 8th with our next update. In the meantime, let's keep the community polls going — we want to know what you're most excited for:

Hello Grand Festival Backers!

Thank you for your patience as our team and factory partners returned from Gen Con (Indianapolis) last week. We’re rested, re-engaged, and our voices are mostly back to normal.

Mass production is still underway for Gloomhaven RPG and Miniatures of Gloomhaven, but we’ve got some light updates to provide, let’s dive in!

Mass production continues! No exciting updates or shenanigans, which is a good thing!

We had such a great time showing off the pre-production copy of Gloomhaven: The Roleplaying Game in person and received lots of great feedback from those of you in attendance. Whether you stopped by the booth or signed up for one of our RPG play events, thank you for stopping by and checking it out!

For those of you we missed, here are some photos of our showcase:

While we leaving for Gen Con, our factory partner let us know their engineers had discovered an issue that needed addressing surrounding our flight stands and flying monsters which has since been resolved and is currently being re-tested for quality. 

As you are probably aware by now, our miniatures are plastic injected at mass quantities with molten plastic and steel molds. While this creates large quantities of high detail miniatures quickly, the variable factors (temp, plastic, timing, cooling, etc) can lead to quality inconsistencies without good controls and assurance checks.

We had performed flight-stand-fit testing throughout our preproduction efforts and called out models that a) fit their flight stand, b) were too tight to fit their flight stand, & c) fit their flight stand but less confidently. These had initially been addressed by the factory team who then kept (thankfully!) a very close eye on those miniatures as mass production kicked off.

What they realized was even despite their modifications to the molds, they still weren’t happy with what was supposed to be a “consistent” fit across all flying models. 

With quality of these miniatures being top priority, we asked them to revisit the mold modifications and fix them ALL consistently across the full line. 

Over the last two weeks they have paused mass production to do just that, and I’m happy to say the new samples we received last night are much improved, more consistent, and ideally much less prone to accidental slippage or breakage. 

While a delay isn’t ideal, we’d much rather deal with this issue now then have to send you replacement parts further down the line when you finally get to those scenarios with flying enemies.

We also took proactive use of this time to discuss further small tray modifications we could implement to improve the user experience out of the box, such as finger indents for smoother removal/replacement.

Production should be picking right back up here any day now once I get the confirmation from our factory that their further testing was successful.

In the meantime, we hope you enjoy this 360 degree look at the Miniatures of Gloomhaven: Summons Expansion Set:

We know this is predominantly a place to update you on our remaining Grand Festival efforts, but we’d be remiss to quickly touch on a new Cephalofair project that will be featuring many of the characters you’ve come to know and recognize from our crowdfunding games like Gloomhaven, Frosthaven, and the Gloomhaven RPG.

If you attended Gen Con with us, or are subscribed to our INSIDERS NEWSLETTER, you may have heard we’ve announced our next brand new game, MERCENARIES WANTED!

MERCENARIES WANTED ($24.99 USD) is a drafting game for 1-6 players designed by Cephalofair’s very own Dennis Vögele (Jaws of the Lion, Frosthaven, Gloomhaven (2025), Mercenary Packs, etc), and takes ~45 mins to play!

In Mercenaries Wanted, players won’t play adventurous Mercenaries this time around. No. Instead, you get to step into the shoes of an adventurous Mercenary HR Manager!

That’s right! Because what is running a company of freelance mercenaries OTHER than one giant human resources puzzle?

I won’t crowd this space with my musing about why I’m so excited, but if you’d like to read a bit more I’ve published a blog here full of post-Gen Con enthusiasm: "Mercenaries Wanted: Why I'm Excited as a Publisher"

Thank you all for your time this week and letting us share about the exciting (and non-exciting) progress being made on all fronts.

I'll be back in two weeks with a very, very, short update to confirm that mass production on miniatures is back up to speed and share any other brief updates.

Let’s end today with a poll, how does that sound?

We had some samples scheduled for arrival late yesterday, so we pushed the update to today. Thank you for your patience.

We've gotten our hands on them, so let's dive in!

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Since our last update, all pre-production sample findings have been addressed, proofed, and implemented for mass production. We are in the manufacturing phase of the timeline!

We also had the Gloomhaven RPG: Core Card Set sample arrive, here are some photos:

With mass production underway our focus for the RPG will shift to the shipping plan. That means we will have less information while this part of the project is being manufactured,  but we’ll gladly continue sharing updates, photos, insights as production moves forward!

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THE MINIATURES ARE MELTING!

Just kidding…well…sorta.

Our factory has let us know that over the last week they’ve been battling an intense heat wave that has led to some pausing of production due to the impact on output quality (warping, detail loss, etc). Plastic injection molding is already done at molten temperatures, but when it's too hot it leads to some engineering problems and warpage during cooling/setting. Luckily, this was all caught by quality control, but it does mean we’re delayed by ~two weeks in SOME of our production efforts. We aren’t happy about this, but waiting is much preferable to melted miniatures.

Onto the positive, trays for Gloomhaven: Core Set came in this week, so here is how these models look all nested in their spots, along with the work-in-progress tray maps Layne has been building for us:

With trays largely out of our way, we also now know our final box dimensions so are completing in fuller confidence our packaging. Below is a "work-in-progress" side by side of each of the spines and how they'll roughly look on your shelf! (fits1.5 Kallax shelf cubes)

Finally, we thought you might appreciate an in-depth look at the Miniatures of Gloomhaven: Core Set now that we have 100% of the production samples in and approved:

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Just a reminder that Julie, Chris, Aaron, myself, and our amazing team of supporters will be out at Gen Con next week (Booth 351) showing off the Gloomhaven RPG and selling advanced copies of our Buttons & Bugs expansion PUB CRAWLERS!  (you can pre-order for Gen Con pickup HERE).

We’ll be running official Gen Con events for Gloomhaven, Buttons & Bugs, and the Gloomhaven RPG as well, you can sign up for those registered events HERE.

Swing by the booth and you may also catch me showcasing a brand new title we’re planning to release at PAX: Unplugged later this year! (Don’t miss the reveal— SUBSCRIBE  to our Insider Newsletter today!)

Can't make it to Gen Con? Don't worry! We've got a fun little activity planned for Gloomhaven fans to participate in at home so keep your eyes on our newsletter and socials above next week.

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That’ll be it for this week.

We’ll be back on Aug 5th with a small post-Gen Con update for you.

Until then, have a great week and we hope you’re staying cool!